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- Raymond Edward Rasmussen, 103, of John Day, died Saturday, June 28, at Country Spice Residential Care Facility, where he had lived since May 2000. A public viewing will be held 4-7 p.m. Sunday, July 6, followed by a vigil, at Driskill Memorial Chapel. A graveside service will be held at Deschutes Memorial Gardens in Bend at 1 p.m. Monday, July 7, with Flora Cheadle officating.
He was born on Sept. 23, 1904, in Rolling, Wis., the sixth of 14 children born to Rasmus John and Theresa (Hoffman) Rasmussen. He found work as a young man in the woods of Wisconsin and Michigan. At one time, he cut oak for the Henry Ford Company. He contracted tuberculosis as a young man and was advised by a doctor to leave Wisconsin. He headed west and worked in the harvests, finally settling in Oregon.
He met Edna Roby in Pendleton and they married Aug. 9, 1941. In 1949, they moved to Fox with Edna's daughter Yvonne, along with their four children: Lenora, Flora, Floyd and Norman. That year, they moved to Long Creek where he worked in the sawmill. In 1951, the family moved to Bates, where he again worked for the sawmill until his retirement. While living in Bates, their fifth child, Dale, was born.
After retirement from the Edward Heinz Lumber Company, he moved to Prairie City for a short time and then settled in Bend, where he worked in the woods and sold firewood. In Nov. 1999, he moved to John Day, where he lived with his daughter, Flora and her husband Jerry Cheadle until he moved to Country Spice.
He enjoyed dancing, fishing, camping and hunting. His last elk hunt was in 1993 at the age of 89. He loved cribbage and was champion of the Cascade Cribbage Classic Tournament, at the age of 82, only two years after he started playing competitively. He entered his last cribbage tournament at the age of 99, only to find that he could not play because he was not able to move the pegs fast enough. In the early 1990s, he was credited in the publication, "Cribbage World," for a rare cribbage hand called "The Straight 11."
He was preceded in death by his wife, Edna, on June 25, 1997; his parents; brothers, Lawrence, Johnny, Elmer, Clarence and Melvin; sisters, Mary, Ruth, Hulda, Christine and Patricia.
Survivors include his siblings, Harold, Theresa and Bernice, all of Wisconsin; daughters, Lenora Healy of Fillmore, Utah and Flora Cheadle of Mt. Vernon; sons, Floyd of Mt. Vernon, Norman of Jennison, Michigan and Dale of Redmond; 12 grandchildren and 16 great-grandchildren.
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1904 - 2008 (103 years)
